I don’t know if “never” is the word I’d use here.
Take it with a grain of salt, but comments like these come to mind:
Where the devs talk about how they’re foreseeing a potentially big tank meta coming up, and are considering buffing heroes like reaper (and mei) specifically because they feel they’d be useful in such a meta
The devs have made other comments like this before- but they’ve absolutely seen him as a strong hero against tanks, and have buffed / nerfed him with specific focus on his capabilities to contest tanks